Unsure Welcome

Orchid Island Visit, November 2006

by Philip Diller

Everyone we met on the island for our three day visit was hospitable, but we were not left with empassioned encouragement to come again. Learning more of the the island's native Tao people's interaction with the modern world left us with a clear sense of possible reasons for this sensibility.

Getting there

Get to Orchid Island 蘭嶼 by boat or by plane. Both leave from Taidong 台東 and are as reliable as the weather, so reservations are not accepted. Flights take 25 minutes on 19 seat planes flying at a few thousand feet over the Pacific. Daily Air Corporation 德安航空 (089) 362-489 is the only airline operating a few flights per day depending on weather. Buy tickets at the airport counter for about 1400 TWD. Get more for your money on the three hour boat trip from Taitong's Fukang Harbor. Roundtrip boat tickets are between 1500 and 2000 TWD available on the boat at sailing time from Golden 金星 or Common Star 恆星 Ferries (089) 281 477.

Location

One of Taiwan's thirteen volcanic islands, Orchid Island, off the eastern coast of Taiwan in the Pacific, at 22°03' N, 121°32' E, is 91 km miles from Taidung 台東, 74 km from Green Island 綠島 to the east, 76 Km from Oluanpi 鵝鑾鼻 on the southernmost tip of Taiwan to the west, and 390 km north of Luzon Island, the Philippines. The island is described as being shaped like a fist. With an area of 45.7 square kilometers and an additional 2 square kilometers at low tide, Orchid Island has a total of 38.5 kilometers of coastline and is 2.8 times bigger than Green Island. Hilly, with eight mountains reaching over 400 meters, the tallest point of Orchid Island is Hongtoushan 紅頭山 at 552m.

Climate

The climate is tropical with humidity often over 90% and an average monthly temperature of 23°C, July temperatures reach 32°C and drop below 20°C only in January. Rainfall averages over 2600 cm annually with just over 100 rain free days per year. From October to January or February, the climate is dominated by northeastern monsoons. Throughout the year a light breeze blows from changing directions, making the summer heat tolerable. The warm Kuroshio Current flows northward from the equator past eastern Taiwan affecting the marine fauna.

Native People

The natives of Orchid island are prevalently called "Yami" by both western and Chinese (雅美) language speakers. The natives do not use the name "Yami" to refer to themselves, the word means "north" and may have been what they were called by their predecessors to the south, in the Philippines. The Yami are also known as the "Tao," pronounced "Da-wu" (達悟) in mandarin Chinese. The natives call themselves "Tao" meaning "man" or "person", "Tao no pongso" meaning "people of the island" or "Tao no Irala" meaning "people of Irala."

History

The island was "undiscovered" until Japanese occupation of Taiwan (1895-1945) when the Japanese government declared the island an off limits ethnological research area and it was not open to tourists until 1967. The relative isolation of Orchid Island has allowed the native Tao to better maintain their traditions, language and culture than the other aborigines of the Taiwan mainland.
The undersea mountain chain connecting Orchid Island to the Phillipines leaves a path of protruding small islands. The Tao migrated to Orchid Island about 800 years ago from the Batan Archipelago (巴丹群島) in the northern Philippines, maintaining communication with their homeland, trading pigs, goats, and millet, for weapons, beads and gold. These exchanges ceased about three centuries ago, after a fight in which most of the Tao visitors on Batan were killed. However. The languages spoken by Tao and Batanese today are mutually intelligible. The Tao fish both during the day and at night. Tao are busiest in the summer when fruit ripens and they prepare for the coming winter. The population of Orchid island is about 4000, of which about 2800 are Tao and the rest are Chinese from Taiwan. Since 1990 about 25 percent of the Yami population has migrated to work in cities on Taiwan.

Island Name

Orchid Island is called "Lanyu" 蘭嶼 (orchid island) by the Chinese; early 17th century Japanese charts list Tabako Shima; during their colonial occupation in the first half of the 20th century, the Japanese called the island Kotosho (red head island); mid 17th century French maps call the island Tabaco Xima; Taiwan Puyuma call it Botol, the Formosan native Ami call it Buturu; the native Tao call their island "Ponso no Tao" or "Pongso no Tao" by the Tao (the island where we live) or "Irala" — land (as opposed to sea); and Botel Tobago is a name given by westerners.

Geology

The island has seen volcanic activity several times since 3.5 Ma (million years ago) up to about 20,000 years ago. Most of Orchid Island is covered by thick piles of Cenozoic andesites (dark-colored vesicular volcanic rocks erupted from volcanic activity associated with convergent plate boundaries.)
The Philippine plate is a small plate between the Eurasian and Pacific plates. The Huatung Basin is a small oceanic basin and constitutes the westernmost part of the Philippine Sea Plate. Lanyu is part of the Luzon Arc that bounds the Huatung Basin to the west. Lanyu is located at the juncture of the Philippine and Eurasian Plates.
The steep mountains of Orchid Island are part of the chain of volcanic islands between Taiwan and Luzon.

Nuclear Waste

In 1974 Taiwan's Atomic Energy Commission selected Long Men 龍門 (Dragon Gate) at the southern tip of Orchid Island as a temporary storage facility for mid and low level nuclear waste. A harbor was built in 1978, construction began in 1980, and shipments began arriving in May of 1982. Since then, the site has been the depository for mid and low level nuclear waste from Taiwan's three nuclear plants.

In the mid-1970s, government representatives tricked the illiterate district commissioner of Orchid Island into agreeing to the project explaining that the plan was to build a fish cannery on the Long Men site. The deception was maintained into the site construction until island churchgoers discovered the truth from mainland Taiwan news reports.

Language

The Tao language is Bashiic, a Malayo-Polynesian tongue, similar to the languages spoken by the Ivatan peoples of the Batanes islands of the Northern Philippines. The Bashi area is the area comprising the islands of the northernmost and smallest province of the Philippines, Batanes, as well as the Bashi Channel and Irala (Orchid Island). The language is still spoken by the older generation, over fifty. The younger Tao mostly speak mandarin Chinese, which is the official language of the Taiwan mainland. Outside a general store we see a woman reading a bible in written in romanized Tao. Everywhere we go, the natives seem to speak to each other in Tao. Our hosts the Li's lament that the younger generation no longer speak Tao, and that the schools only instruct in Tao for one hour per day.

The major settlements of Orchid Island

Tao

Chinese

meaning

Yayu

椰油 Yeyou

coconut oil/butter

Iraralay

朗島 Langdao

bright island

Iranumilk

東清 Dongqing

east clear

Ivarinu

野銀 Yeyin

country/wild silver

Imourud

紅頭 Hongtou

red head

Iratai

漁人 Yuren

fisherman

Iwatas

伊瓦達斯 Yiwadasi

(phonetic)

Tianchi 天池

In the airport picture essays document the opening up of Tianchi to make the area more accessible to tourists. Great trees were cut down to build the wooden stairway easing hikers' ascent to the lake in the volcano crater. Construction cables and bricks have been left along the path. Sections of the woooden walkway are unfinished. Mr. Chong warns us that we won't see many orchids along the heavily trafficed path. Like the cement harbors and nuclear waste dump, none of these "developments" seem to have brought any benefit to the natives.

The Butterfly Orchid

In January 19, 1946, the island was redesignated as Hongtouyu Township (紅頭嶼鄉 "Red-headed Island") of Taitung County 台東縣 and on November 24 of that year was renamed to 蘭嶼 (Lan Yu) or Orchid Island, after the indigenous Phalaenopsis aphropdite 台灣蝴蝶蘭 or butterfly orchid.

The earliest scientific record of the orchid dates back to 1879, when the plant was "discovered" on Orchid Island. Overlooked by experts until half a century ago, Phalaenopsis amabilis var. formosa became a household word among orchid aficionados the world over when hybrids won top prize at an international orchid show in California two years in a row in 1952 and 1953. Three years later, another hybrid of this Taiwanese orchid won a gold medal at the Nantes International Flower Festival in 1956, stunning festival goers with 300 blossoms. Sudden popularity led to 30 years of ravaging economic exploitation as natives even cut down old trees to reach the lucrative blossoms. The butterfly orchid quickly approached extinction on the island.

Taiwan's most commonly cultivated orchids — accounting for about 65 percent of the country's exports are those belonging to the genus Phalaenopsis, meaning "moth-appearance," from which comes the common English name moth orchids. In Taiwan, they are called butterfly orchids. Moth orchids are usually found at altitudes from 300 to 1,500 meters above sea level. Taiwan's only two local moth orchid species are P. amabilis and P. equestris, which are also found, respectively, in Indonesia and the Philippines. Phalaenopsis is the most popular cultivated orchid species on Taiwan. The local variety leads in the world in quality, variety and production quantity. In 2004, Taiwanese phalaenopsis industry was worth NT$ 2 billion.

Orchid Island birds not on the Taiwan mainland

Chestnut-eared Bulbul

棕耳鵯

Microscelis amaurotis

Japanese White-eye

綠繡眼

Zosterops japonica batanis

Black Paradise Flycatcher

黑綬帶鳥

Terpsiphone atrocaudata periophthalmica

Large Brown Cuckoo Dove

長尾鳩

Macropygia phasianella

Red-capped Green Pigeon

紅頭綠鳩

Treron formosae

Lanyu Scops Owl

蘭嶼角鴞（紅角鴞）

Otus elegans botelensis

The Scops owl as well as many of the butterflies and plants are considered "evil spirits" by the native culture. Perhaps this has contributed to preservation of the natural environment?

Native Diet

Sources of food include fish and other seafood. Men go out spearfishing and net fishing at dusk in their traditional boats, usually many men in one boat. We see fish drying on lines in front of homes in many of the villages. Many varieties of fish, crabs and octopus are harvested from the ocean. The Tao are known for eating flying fish. Tao Culture specifically advises which fish men or women can eat. Young men and women may not even touch certain fish that are not "safe" for them and most houses have two sets of cooking utensils to handle the two classes of fish. Women also collect seaweeds and mussels in tidal pools. On land, the Tao's key staple is taro grown in wet fields. They also grow other crops that do not require working the soil with tools, including yams, millet, sugarcane and onions. Cultivated fruits include bananas, pineapples, coconuts, pumpkins and other vine melons. The islanders also raise goats and pigs which can be seen running about on roads and near homes almost everywhere. Men and women alike seem to chew betelnut all day. Riding home at dusk through fields we nearly run over a rat.

Jiananyuan handicraft workshop

The Jiananyuan handicraft workshop 迦南園工藝坊 just past Langdao elementary school in Langdao village 朗島 sells small carvings and jewelery. The proprietors make many pieces themselves and also sell crafts of other island artists. They are also working to revive the craft of making beads from local plants seeds.

References and Resources:

The Lanyu Website
An experimental pilot project of the Digital Library/Museum of the Academia Sinica
including overview descriptions of the people and land and the following articles:

Gold and Silver on Botel Tobago: The Silver Helmet Of The Yami

Three Genealogical Stories From Botel Tobago: A Contribution To The Folklore Of The Yami
Beauclair, Inez, 1959 Bulletin of the Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica 7: 105-140.

The Loss of the Benjamin Sewall
On Friday, 10 October 1903, a despatch arrived at Lloyds, London, from An-ping, Formosa, stating that, "The American ship Benjamin Sewall and her cargo has been lost at the Pescadores."
the Takao CLub web site notes:

Much of the information above has been taken from a book entitled 'Ship Benjamin Sewall', written by Douglas Egan and published in 1982 by Ye Galleon Press, Washington.

The journal of Helen Jackson Piper is contained among her papers held at the Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College. Amongst these papers there is also an unpublished account of her experiences on this voyage entitled "The Girl in the Lifeboat".